KARACHI, Oct 23: Many civil society organizations and activists have urged the government to recognise the alarming gaps in its disaster management capability and policies, which were exposed in the massive Oct 8 earthquake.
They noted that while there was an outburst of fellow feelings and concerns among Pakistanis across the country, the organized and trained volunteers of civil defence were missing. As such, the country had to rely on foreign experts to extricate many alive from under the rubbles.
They called for reactivating the civil defence volunteer service in all the major cities of the country, free from political and government control and exploitation and on modern lines.
A former chief warden, Civil Defence, Choudhry Mazhar Ali, who now lives in Cardiff, Wales, UK, was shocked to note the absence of Green Helmets.
According to Civil Defence Act of 1952, all the major cities, like Karachi, Lahore, Hyderabad, Peshawar, Quetta and Muzaffarabad, should have one fully trained and equipped warden for 1,300 persons. As such the city of Karachi should have at least 100,000 fully trained and equipped wardens ready to meet any disaster.
There should be at least 300 Warden Posts at proper locations in the city. These posts are supposed to keep shovels, ropes, stretchers, emergency lights, fire fighting equipment and first aid boxes ready at all times.
Unfortunately due to lack of interest of the concerned quarters, he said, the Civil Defence Organization has been ignored and now it existed only on papers.
He recalled that Karachi had a training school in Nazimabad for training Razakars for rescue and other important tasks during any emergency. That training school was closed and another one was opened in Gulshan-i-Iqbal but it was charging money for imparting training to “Razakars” (volunteers) who mostly come from poor families.
Mr Choudhry said that when the Civil Defence Organization was under the control of the Sindh government, its policies and budget allocations were made by the Home Department of Sindh. But since it has been put under the control of the City government, it has further slumped into dormancy and has become virtually non-existent because of non-availability of funds and lack of interest on part of the concerned departments.
He stressed that this essential services of the city, including the Warden Service, needed social patronage.
He recalled that when he was Chief Warden of the city, there were about 500 trained wardens, although no proper equipment was available.
Yet the service was providing some help to the citizens during heavy rains and other local problems. About a dozen prominent social workers were given training to act as incident officers in case of a major disaster.
He acknowledged that there was no doubt that Pakistan Army and some NGOs were doing a “wonderful job” of helping the countrymen after the earthquake, yet many of them were not trained to do this job. As such they are facing problems. Had there been fully trained and equipped Warden Service in Rawalpindi, Islamabad and Muzaffarabad, as required by law of the land, the situation with regard to rescue and relief operation would have been different, he said.
Emphasizing the need for organizing the Civil Defence corps on modern lines, Mr Choudhry said that an Authority has been proposed to deal with matters pertaining to earthquake.
He said that the country cannot afford the luxury of such authorities and feared that funds could be squandered in such a way.
He was of the view that Civil Defence Warden Service was for the people and by the people. It is purely a voluntary organization and the volunteers are even supposed to make their own uniforms.
Meanwhile, the Participatory Development Initiatives (PDI) has decided to launch a research-based campaign for integrated disaster management in Sindh and has demanded of Sindh Government to ensure representation of the reputed civil society organizations and disaster management experts in the 19-member Disaster Management Committee notified by the provincial government recently. Sikander Brohi of the SDI in a letter to the Sindh Chief Minster and Governor of Sindh, has expressed fears that the committee having no representation from the civil society organizations working in the field of disaster relief, rehabilitation and management might not be able to come up with a sustainable and integrated disaster management plan for the province.
“The province is vulnerable to most of the natural hazards. It is prone to floods, droughts, earthquake, cyclonic storms and sea erosion in its coastal region. Karachi, the capital city of the province and the metropolitan city of Pakistan, is also considered vulnerable earthquakes and cyclones. Construction of high–rise buildings in the city without any proper regulation has posed threat to the lives of millions of city’s residents”, the PDI said.
The letter emphasized that the magnitude of different kinds of disasters had been high in Sindh. For example, severe drought periods in 2000 and 2002 affected livelihoods, resulted in human deaths, pushed tens of thousands of people to migrate, and killed large numbers of cattle. The most recent significant earthquake occurred in 2001, in Sindh (which also hit Gujarat in India) resulting in 12 deaths and thousands of people becoming affected. The coastal areas of Sindh are most vulnerable to cyclones. A cyclone in 1965 killed over 1000 people in Sindh, while the most recent cyclone, which hit two districts in Southern Sindh in 1999, killed more than 500 and left over 666,000 affected. Economic losses were severe with over 75,000 houses destroyed and corps and agricultural land inundated.
“Unfortunately, there is no disaster management polices and plan for the province. There are some outdated laws and rules governing the issues related to disasters of different kinds. Those laws and rules include: Sindh Natural Calamities (Prevention and Relief Act. 1958, District Disaster Relief Plan 1977 (For each district) and Sindh Local Government Ordinance 2001” the SDI in its letter said.
